[imagesource: here]

Do you remember that song in The Wedding Singer?

The one that plays at the end that goes “I know this much is true”?

For some, that may be the only song they remember from Spandau Ballet, the English new wave band formed in Islington, London, in 1979, inspired by the capital’s post-punk underground dance scene.

Here’s the music video below so that you can take it in all its 80s glory:

Superb.

The band name has a great ring to it, and they did pretty alright, selling 25 million albums and having 23 hit singles worldwide, but what does it actually mean?

Well, if you do some digging, you might be surprised.

Here’s iHeart80s:

According to some sources, the name Spandau Ballet could point to two possible meanings: one refers to the jerky movements of Nazi war prisoners hanged at Spandau prison as they were hanged, or according to others, it refers to enemy lines getting shot down by a German World War II machine gun MG42 Spandau.

Okay, that escalated quickly.

The band says they took their name from graffiti on a nightclub wall in Berlin that read: “Rudolf Hess, all alone, dancing the Spandau Ballet”.

To expand on the two theories mentioned above, Spandau, where prisoners of war were hanged, was a prison in the city famous for containing Hess, Hitler’s deputy, but the term does indeed have its origins in World War II.

When Spandau guns are fired at a target’s shins, they would jump around.

Lovely images to take with you into the weekend.

You can find some less jarring stories about band name origins here.

[source:iheart80s]